The Mammoth Book of Killers at Large (the mammoth book of ...)

by Nigel Cawthorne

  There was a strong military connection between these victims. Nancy Gidley served four years in the Air Force and had been discharged at Hamilton Air Force Base early the previous year. Rosa Vasquez was a keypunch operator at Letterman General Hospital at San Francisco’s Presidio. Angela Thomas was the daughter of an Army sergeant who was once stationed at the Presidio. In San Francisco for a visit, she was last seen in the area of the Presidio, where she had gone to look up old friends. And Yvonne Quilantang was engaged to a soldier who was stationed in Missouri, though she was pregnant by another man.

  By now an established trend was obvious. Only the location changed. Four young women were strangled and dumped naked in San Francisco in the spring and early summer of 1973 before hitch-hiker Caroline Davis was poisoned and dumped in a ditch near Santa Rosa in July. It was the same spot that Strong and Weber’s remains had also been discovered.

  Fifteen-year-old Carolyn Nadine Davis was last seen leaving her grandmother’s house in Garberville on 15 July 1973. A runaway from Anderson in Shasta County she went missing while hitch-hiking south on Route 101. On 31 July 1973, her naked body was found 2.2 miles north of Porter Creek Road on Franz Valley Road in the same spot as Yvonne Weber and Maureen Strong had been dumped seven months earlier. She had been poisoned by strychnine and the police discovered that Carolyn had bought a one-way ticket to fly from Redding to San Francisco. On the embankment above her body, twigs were placed in strange design to form two interlocking squares. This was thought to be a witchcraft symbol designating “the carrier of spirits”. Again the Zodiac killer was interested in such symbols.

  The next body turned up near Redding on 22 July. It belonged to Nancy Feusi. Practically naked, it was so badly decomposed the cause of death could not be determined.

  Back in San Francisco, the naked body of Laura O’Dell was found on 4 November. She had been strangled.

  On 22 December 1973, 22-year-old Therese Dian Walsh disappeared while hitch-hiking on 101 from Malibu Beach to her home in Garberville. She had been hog-tied with a one-quarter-inch nylon rope, raped, strangled and thrown into a creek near the spot where Kim Wendy Allen’s body was found. Some believe that there is an occult significance that she went missing on the winter solstice.

  The police believe the same killer stabbed Brenda Merchant in Marysville on 1 February 1974, dumping her naked body in a ditch alongside a rural road. Then on 29 September, the naked body of Donna Braun was discovered floating in the Salinas River near Monterey. The 14-year-old had been strangled. She was thought to have been the last of the killer’s victims.

  The idea that these murders might have had occult significance was put forward by Sergeant Erwin Carlstedt of the Sonoma County Police. He cited the “witchcraft symbol” found on the embankment in the Caroline Davis case, though they could have been just a piece of childish art. He also pointed out that the bodies had all been dumped on the east side of a road. At the time he tied the California killings to those of seven women in Washington state, between January and July 1974, who had all been abducted in the waning—or sacrificial—phase of the moon. His 1975 report stated that the killer was “familiar with witchcraft or the occult, because of a witchcraft symbol found during the Caroline Davis case and the possible occult involvement in the missing females in the states of Oregon and Washington”. However, the Washington killings were later attributed to prolific serial killer Ted Bundy, while Bundy’s known movements preclude involvement in the California murders.

  Serial rapist and murder Harvey Carignan was a suspect in the unsolved murders, when it came to light that he had been given a speeding ticket he collected in Solano County, east of Santa Rosa, on 20 June 1973. But no solid evidence ties him to any of the murders. One week later, he attacked Marlys Townsend at a bus stop 1,500 miles away in Minneapolis. Clubbed unconscious from behind, she woke in Carignan’s car, still groggy from the blow. But when he tried to make her masturbate him, she found strength enough to leap from the speeding vehicle and save herself. This ultimately led to his arrest in September 1974 and he was already in jail when Donna Braun was murdered. Besides none of the crimes showed Carignan’s MO. He beat his victims with a hammer.

  In his book Zodiac, published in 1986, author Robert Graysmith ascribes these and other unsolved murders to the elusive “Zodiac” killer. But as he has not been caught, then it is impossible to say whether one or more serial killers are at large in the Golden State.

  Southern California’s Original Night Stalker

  While “The Night Stalker” Richard Ramirez, who terrorized southern California in 1985, languishes on death row in San Quentin, “The Original Night Stalker” is still at large. He started out as the “East Area Rapist”, then became the “Orange Coast Serial Killer”, before being dubbed “The Original Night Stalker” because his MO closely resembled Ramirez’s, raping and killing his victims in their own homes.

  As the East Area Rapist he committed 50 rapes in northern California between 1976 and 1986 and killed at least ten—Orange County Sheriff’s Office says 12—in southern California. We know the grand total because an enterprising Orange County criminologist matched DNA samples from the crimes in northern and southern California in 2001.

  The Stalker began by raping women that were at home alone, then gradually moved on to couples, targeting “low-risk” victims—lawyers, medical professionals, computer programmers—people without a great deal of physical strength who were unlikely to fight back. He stalked upper-middle-class neighbourhoods looking for victims who lived in single-storey homes. He broke in late at night, then pulled a handgun. Always well-prepared, he brought pre-cut lengths of rope and cord with him to bind his victims. When attacking a couple, he would sometimes force the man to lie on the floor with perfume bottles or plates stacked on top of him while he raped the female, threatening to kill them both if the man moved enough to tip the bottles onto the floor or rattle the dishes.

  The first 15 victims in late 1976 and early 1977 were women at home alone—though one attack was in the parking lot. Victims included a 16-year-old girl and an 18-year-old youth in East Sacramento who was shot in the stomach when he confronted and chased the prowler. The perpetrator escaped even though a police cordon was thrown around the neighbourhood. In one case, he seems to have waited until a woman’s husband left the house before he attacked.

  At the beginning of November 1976, a reward of $2,500 was offered for information leading to his arrest. That was later increased to $25,000, with a local dentist adding $10,000 to the $15,000 offered by the Sacramento Bee’s Secret Witness programme.

  The Bee said that the perpetrator entered houses though a window like a “cat-burglar” and gave a description. He was white with a pale complexion, between 5 feet 8 inches to 6 feet tall, 25 to 35 years old, with a medium build and dark hair that hangs over his ears and collar.

  Later descriptions make him younger—between 18 and 25 –of a slighter build. Though muscular, it was thought he weighed 140 to 180 pounds and was extremely agile.

  “He has worn a mask, but descriptions are vague as to what kind,” the newspaper said. He also wore gloves, so left no fingerprints. “He has worn military type boots and black tennis shoes. His weapons have included a revolver, knife, a stick and a club. He has cut and beaten his victims, but none severely.”

  The Bee added chillingly: “He frequently commits repeated attacks on individual victims over a period of three hours.”

  This was a serial killer waiting to happen.

  The suspect attacked a single-storey, single family dwelling in a middle- or upper-middle-class neighbourhood. Nearby there was usually a drainage ditch, vacant field, new construction, park area or one of the levees of the American River that runs through Sacramento, so he could approach and make his exit with little chance of being spotted. He entered a residence in the night time through an unlocked sliding glass door or window, though he pried open doors and windows if necessary. Once inside he threatened the victim with a knife
, gun or club. He tied her with the ligatures—often shoelaces—he brought with him. Then he used strips of towelling and electrical cord found in the house to further bind, gag and blindfold his victims. He usually cut the telephone cord and covered a lamp to dim the lighting.

  He spent between one and three hours in the house, sexually assaulting the victim several times. In between the assaults, he would wander about the house, eating and drinking. Sometimes he would even go out. Beverage containers were found outside where the suspect apparently stood, watching for anyone approaching the house. He would also look through photograph albums and lingerie drawers, stealing small items of costume jewellery, class rings, an earring and items of little value.

  Because of the way he moved in and out of the house, the victim rarely knew when her attacker had left the premises. It would usually take her between 30 minutes and an hour before she was able to free herself. Sometimes she would be unable to do so and had to await assistance.

  After April he began attacking couples, though he varied his pattern slightly when teenagers were involved. In one case, he raped two sisters who were at home alone together. He also molested a 13-year-old girl while her mother was tied up, and raped a 15-year-old babysitter in front of her eight-year-old ward.

  On 7 May 1977, while attacking a couple in Carmichael, the rapist said that he would kill his next two victims. This was what the police had long feared. But he stayed his hand when he attacked a couple on the South Area of Sacramento, near the office of the dentist who had put up the $10,000 reward. Gun and lock sales soared.

  It became plain to the police that the attacker had detailed knowledge of his victims. He knew that the father of one victim was out of town for the weekend and that another’s father was on vacation. The rapist knew families’ habits and work hours. He caught one victim when her sister was visiting friends and her parents were at a Christmas Party; another when her parents were out; another when her parents were away for the weekend.

  He knew the schedule of spouses, catching one woman when her husband had relocated to the Bay Area where she was to follow; another when her husband was on a business trip; another when her husband had just left for work; and a fourth when her husband had started on the night shift just two days before the attack. And he attacked one woman who was separated from her husband when her son was visiting his father.

  He knew the purse of one victim was in her car. In another attack he knew where the garage door opener was. In another case where the outside lights were on a timer, he knew how to turn them off.

  During one attack, the assailant said that he had seen the victim at Mather Officer’s Club and knew her husband was a captain in the Air Force. However, his intelligence was not always 100 per cent accurate. In one case, he mentioned that his victim attended American River College. She did not, but a neighbour, who strongly resembled the victim, had attended American River College. It was thought that the offender had been in the other woman’s home as well.

  It was clear how he got this information. Old footprints from herringbone-pattern tennis shoes were discovered under the bathroom window in numerous cases where he could have overheard conversations. He also returned to the same area repeatedly, making maximum use of the intelligence he had gathered.

  The police almost caught the attacker on 12 December 1977, when officers spotted a man wearing a ski mask on a stolen bicycle on the Watt Avenue bridge in the East Area of Sacramento. He was seen again two hours later by city patrolmen near an apartment complex on La Riviera Drive near Watt, a place where he had struck three times before.

  As his career as a serial rapist lengthened, he got more violent, cruel, abusive and threatening. He made nine more increasingly savage attacks before he finally lived up to his word and became a killer on 2 February 1978, when he shot dead Brian K. Maggiore, a sergeant at Rancho Cordova Air Force Base, and his wife of 18 months Katie. They confronted a prowler when walking their dog down a quiet residential street. Katie was shot in the head. Brian was pursued into the backyard of a home on La Alegria Drive where he was shot fatally in the chest. The suspect was spotted by residents as he fled the scene. He was described as white, in his mid twenties, 6 feet to 6 feet 2 inches tall with dark hair and wearing a brown leather coat with a large stain on the back and dark pants and shoes. He may have been with an accomplice. A pair of shoelaces were found at the crime scene. Two weeks later composite drawings of the suspects were published in the Sacramento Bee. After that, the East Area Rapist never struck in the Sacramento area again.

  He moved on to Stockton, Modesto, Danville, Fremont, Concord, San Ramon, Davis and Walnut Creek, and attacked couples and, occasionally, women on their own. A student at UC Davis was attacked in her apartment with extreme physical violence on 7 June 1978. A month later another woman was attacked in Davis and raped in front of her two sons. And on 25 June 1979, a 13-year-old girl was attacked while her parents were at home asleep.

  On 1 October 1979, a man in a ski mask entered the home of a couple in Goleta, Santa Barbara County. They were awakened, a flashlight shining in their eyes. The woman was ordered to tie up her boyfriend with pre-cut lengths of cord that the attacker had brought with him. While the masked intruder ransacked the house supposedly looking for money, the woman managed to get out of the house and scream for help. The intruder pulled her back inside. While he was doing this, the man escaped into the backyard. While the intruder pursued the man, the woman escaped again, running into the arms of a neighbour who had been alerted by her screams. Having lost control of the situation, the intruder fled. He was seen escaping on a bicycle and he disappeared down a creek bed.

  After this couple escaped, the attacker turned to killing in earnest. Two months later, on 30 December 1979, another couple was attacked a few blocks away. Dr Robert Offerman and Alexandria Manning were found shot to death. Both of them were tied up and Manning had been raped. Examination of the crime scene led detectives to believe that Offerman had managed to loosen his bindings and lunge at the intruder before he was shot and killed. Neighbours who heard the gunshots thought that they were firecrackers.

  On 13 March 1980, the Stalker moved just 35 miles down the coast to Ventura, where he killed Lyman and Charlene Smith. Charlene was raped and both were bludgeoned to death with a log from their fireplace. The Smiths were found still bound in their bedroom by their 12-year-old son. Their wrists and ankles had been tied with drapery cord and an ornate “Chinese knot” was used on their wrists. Though there were similarities to the attacks in Goleta, the Smiths’ murder was not immediately linked to the others. Ventura Detectives suspected Joe Alsip, a former business partner of Lyman Smith, who was later exonerated.

  Keith and Patrice Harrington were the next to die, also bludgeoned to death in their home in Dana Point on 19 August, as the killer moved south of Los Angeles for the first time. This time the murderer untied his victims before leaving, but left some cord lying on the bed. He took the murder weapon with him when he left. A single burnt match was found in the home by investigators. Patrice had been brutally raped before her death. Law enforcement agencies theorized that the male victims were bludgeoned to death first. Then the terrified female victims were raped before they too were killed by bludgeoning.

  Next the killer attacked 28-year-old Manuela Witthuhn on 5 January 1981, while her husband was in the hospital ill. Her killer entered her home in Irvine, Orange County. He raped her and beat her to death, then disappeared, taking with him the bindings along with the murder weapon and, curiously, Witthuhn’s answering machine, a lamp and a crystal curio. As in the Smith’s case, burnt matches were found in Witthuhn’s home.

  Cheri Domingo and Gregory Sanchez were killed on 27 July 1981 back in Goleta, just half-a-mile from the scene of the Offerman-Manning murders. Sanchez had been shot once in the face and then bludgeoned to death. Cheri Domingo was bludgeoned. Again, the killer took the ligatures he had used to bind his victims and the murder weapon with him. The attacker’s familiarity w
ith the area lead police to believe he lived near the San Jose Creek.

  Then for five years, the killer lay low. He struck one last time on 4 May 1986, killing Janelle Lisa Cruz only a mile from Witthuhn’s home in Irvine. Her family was away on vacation in Mexico at the time. Cruz was raped and beaten to death like the previous victims. The murder weapon was thought to be a pipe wrench that was found to be missing from her home. Cruz was slain soon after a male friend left her house. The man told police he had heard strange noises outside Janelle’s bedroom window before he had left, but she said they came from the washing machine.

  Then the killer vanished completely, though it is thought that he made a telephone call to one of his victims in 1990 or 1991.

  It was actually not until 2001 that his murders as the Original Night Stalker in the later part of his career and his rapes as the East Area Rapist earlier were definitively linked by DNA evidence. It is also thought that this prodigious criminal committed many other crimes, including two other home-invasion attacks where couples were killed in Goleta, California, from 1979 to 1981. In these crimes, a gun and bludgeoning were used and the victims were bound, but no sexual assault took place and there is no DNA evidence to link the Goleta crimes to the unsolved rapes and murders of the Original Night Stalker.

  The killer has never been caught or identified, and is probably out here now. Younger victims put his age as middle to late twenties, while older ones said he was only 18 or 19. That means that in 2007, he would only be in his forties or fifties.

  He had blue or hazel eyes. Type “A” blood was found after he cut himself with a knife—this victim’s blood was type “O”. He wears size nine shoes. Victims saw him wear brown lace-up boots, black high top military boots, ankle-high brown lace-up shoes, brown leather desert boots, black square-toed boots, black tennis shoes and red, white and blue tennis shoes. Impressions left by the prowler outside victims’ home and footmarks left within show a herring-bone pattern.